Ahhhhh I am sooooooo soooooorry about the long wait for this chapter but SO MUCH happened! Like, my brain is STILL trying to catch up to everything. But, it's the summer and I only have one class now so hopefully I'll be able to actually finish this story SOON.

Anyway, one of the things that happened was that my computer was slowly dying, and still is really, but I had it reformatted and scrubbed clean of viruses so that it could at least last me through this semester and maybe next. The unfortunate effect of doing that wiped my version of Microsoft Word, and so I apologize now for any grammatical errors you find in this chapter, although there shouldn't be TOO many as I started this chapter in Word a while ago. I'm currently downloading something that my brother claims to be just as good as word, and is free, but I'm not sure, as he's too tech savvy for me, so his opinion of what's 'just as good' and mine differ slightly (his usually being 'more complicated than is necessary'.) So, I guess we'll see.

But, I'm still writing, so hopfully the next chapter won't take forever to write. In the meantime check out some of my other works if you haven't, I'm also rewriting a trilogly that I wrote with a friend and may be starting on another fic soon, once I'm done with this.

Red cried out as he was tackled to the floor, laser missing Zim's head by a good five inches.

"How about you shut the hell up!" Dib yelled, punching Red in the face before being pulled off by Purple and his impressive looking mechanical spider legs.

"Dib!" Zim shouted in surprise before quickly looking around and finding his laser. He picked it up and aimed, shooting at Purple's pak.

Purple gasped, the laser leaving a burn on the metal but leaving it otherwise unharmed. The legs dropped Dib and Purple whirled on Zim who fired again. Purple guarded with his gauntlets and fired his own laser on the defect.

Dib grunted when he fell, staring at an angry looking Red, now standing, his height towering slightly over the human's standing height.

"We're going to wipe out your entire RACE!" He hissed, pulling Dib up by his hair and holding him out at arm's length to prevent the human from swinging at him. "It's a shame really. You human's make such good slaves. Maybe we'll keep just YOU alive so at the very least you can witness your race's fate. Then you can serve us for the rest of your miserable life, with the knowledge that YOU are the reason there are no more humans."

Dib grunted, holding onto the alien gauntlet. He put his weight on it, almost hanging from the thin arm that should not be able to support the human's weight, so he could bring his foot up and kick the taller in the stomach.

Dib dropped once more, Red doubling over. It was not an overly disarming move thanks to all the armor, but the force pushed him back and gave Dib just enough time to draw a gun of his own from a holster on his hip. He aimed it at Red's head, but the tall irken dodged just in time. The bullet shattered on impact with the floor, releasing a burst of water from inside.

Zim ducked behind one of the computer consoles as Purple fired at him, narrowly escaping the blast.

"Why couldn't you be a good defect and stay BANISHED!" Purple shouted, glaring and firing again in rage, though he knew it couldn't hit its target and that he was only causing damage to his computers.

Zim grit his teeth, avoiding old feelings of pride that just caused pain. Instead he peaked out from around the computer, aiming his laser and firing. Purple was too slow this time, and screamed as he dropped to the floor, a hand going to hold his face in pain.

"Purple!" Red shouted, distracted, turning to his partner. Smoke was billowing from a hole in his face where an eye once was. That beautiful violet eye!

"You disgusting defect!" Red yelled, enraged that his partner had been marred so and turned his attention away from the human.

Red's spider legs sprouted from his pak, tips lighting up in a dangerous looking red. Zim managed to dodge in just enough time to avoid the large, square shaped laser that completely destroyed the terminal he'd been hiding behind.

Dib gasped, eyes widening for just a moment before he fired his gun, a bullet piercing through the flesh of thin legs and exploding, the acidic water dissolving green flesh and alien muscle.

Red dropped to the floor as well, Dib aiming his gun at the Tallest's head, yelling, "Give up! You can't win this!"

Purple was still crying out in pain for his lost eye, Zim getting up and pointing his own gun at that Tallest's head.

"Don't SPARE them Dib!" Zim yelled, antennae back in a show of extreme anger. "Let me kill them RIGHT now!"

"That's not going to solve anything!" Dib yelled before pausing to think about that. "Okay, that'll solve SOME things, but we will never gain control of the overall irken problem if we just kill them!"

"I don't CARE about the 'irken problem'!" Zim yelled. "Because of all the pain they caused ME personally they should die!"

"Zim, you can't just DO that!" Dib argued. "It will make you feel better in the moment but it's not going to make things better!"

Red watched the two back and forth, growling after a moment and grabbing the human's gun, elbowing him in the stomach. The Tallest drew up on spider legs, keeping the weight off his injured leg and holding the human around the neck tight, almost suffocating him.

Zim quickly aiming his laser at Red, but Red was defending himself by using the human as a shield.

"You should listen to the defect, human." Red said, as though admitting to having cheated at a board game. "He knows these things."

"Let him go!" Zim barked. "That's my human!"

"I don't think so." Red said as he trained the human's own gun on his head. "Drop your weapon Zim."

Zim growled in irritation. Dib and his dumb toys. He could have just used a high pressure water gun!

"I said drop it!" Red yelled once more.

Zim sneered at this defeat, dropping his laser to the ground and holding his hands up in defeat.

"That's it." Red said in a mocking voice. "Why can't you ALWAYS be this obedient?"

Dib thrashed, trying to get out of the alien grip, but his feet were not quite planted firmly enough on the ground. He thrashed more when Red trained the gun on Zim.

"Don't move," The Tallest said, grinning. A bang rang out through the room, and for a moment time stood still.

Dib waited for Zim to fall, screaming in pain, but instead he felt it was himself that was falling and he hit the floor with a 'thud'.

It took a moment for him to realize that he had the weight of the red Tallest on top of him, and that both he and Zim were fine.

In poured a squad of several armored humans, all of them wearing the colors of Gaz's troop.

"Grab the shorter irken and Dib," The commander said to a few troops before turning to some others. "You take the Tallests, put them in the holding cell… if they're still alive."

The rest was a blur of stars and green. They were hustled onto a ship and taken back to the base, all the while Zim was strangely quiet. They got very little alone time as they were both examined and questioned. Then of course Karen and the kids had to come in and fuss over them. Zim clung to Lix the entire time they visited before they were told they needed to go back to their room. Karen agreed to take both kids while Zim and Dib took time to recuperate.

"He takes after you, you know." Dib said after a while, sitting in a hospital bed next to Zim. Zim looked over at the human out of the corner of his eye before turning fully to Dib and punching him in the shoulder.

"How could you let Lix trade himself for me!" He yelled, glaring. "Lix is SO much more important! You're his father, you should have protected him!"

Dib grunted, rubbing the abused shoulder before saying, "I didn't have a choice! Like I said, he takes after YOU!"

"And you told him about me without me!" Zim yelled.

"Look, do you REALLY want to argue right now!" Dib barked. "Because I can argue 'til we're both blue in the face! Or whatever color you Irkens turned when you run out of breath!"

Zim opened his mouth to say something witty and Zim-like but Dib cut him off in a hurry.

"But!" He said. "I'd rather cherish the fact that everyone is safe and the Tallest have been defeated and we have each other again."

Zim's mouth closed, though he looked at the human in aggravation.

Dib wrapped his arms around Zim, who, upon contact, Dib realized was shaking slightly.

"Zim?"

"I wanted to kill them so badly." Zim almost whispered. "They should be dead for what they put me through."

"Zim, we can't be all mad at them." Dib said, and added quickly before the little green alien could punch him again. "If they hadn't held you captive you would have just given Lix away or terminated him. Because of them we have a son together. A little creature made of you and me. For that, at least, we can spare them for a more formal execution, right?"

Zim looked up at Dib, still looking angry for a moment before sighing. "I guess so."

"Good," Dib said, hugging Zim tight. "Now come on, let's find our family."

Dib stood to lead Zim out of the med ward, but Zim quickly grabbed the human's arm and said, "Wait."

Dib looked annoyed, but paused, asking, "What?"

"What about Karen?" He asked, looking at Dib seriously.

Dib looked guilty, and for a moment Zim thought Dib was going to say that he couldn't leave her, and Zim wouldn't have blamed Dib.

"Zim, she and I were never in love." Dib explained. "She's always just been my friend. Our marriage was just her helping me out with my father, and Hollin was a happy accident. I told her about you long before we married and she knew when she offered to marry me that eventually it would have to end."

Zim didn't look sure, and Did leaned in to kiss the alien, which he accepted eagerly.

"Come on," The human said. "We can talk about this tonight after dinner."

Zim accepted this and let Dib lead him to the human's apartment where Karen, Hollin, Lix, and Gaz were waiting.

"Hey Gaz, what are you doing here?" Dib asked. "I thought you'd be long gone by now."

"I had to see my niece and nephew before I was off." Gaz explained. "And I wanted to inform you that I will be taking the Tallest with me. My station is closer to the Irken Empire, so I can more easily use the Tallest as leverage."

"Make sense, do what you want with them, but let us know when you plan to execute." Dib said, feeling a bit safer with the knowledge that Gaz would be taking control of that.

"Will do." Gaz said, although looking to be addressing Zim more than Dib. Zim gave a nod of understanding and thanks, which Gaz seemed to ignore in favor of the children.

After a few moments of socializing Gaz had to leave and she waved everyone good-bye as she walked out, leaving the family alone.

Zim was careful to avoid eye contact with Karen, still feeling very weird about how this situation ended up. How would Hollin be affected by all of this? Lix was irken, Zim knew he would be fine, no matter what happened, but he knew from human television shows that human children were fragile, especially when it came to their parents.

"Have you made up your mind then, Dib?" Karen asked, looking at Dib with a smile.

"Let's talk after dinner." Dib said, smiling back and nodding.

They all ate in almost silence, the only conversation being one between Hollin and Lix, Hollin being jealous that Lix got to go on an adventure and she didn't. Lix tried to explain that it was very dangerous, but Hollin still insisted that she could have been useful.

After dinner the children were allowed to go off and play while Dib, Zim, and Karen sat in the living room, Zim feeling very uncomfortable.

"I can have the papers drawn up tomorrow, Dib." Karen said, looking completely at ease.

"That's fantastic." Dib said, hugging Zim, who looked up at the human woman, confused.

"Is it really that easy?" Zim asked, pouting in his confusion. "What about Hollin?"

"She'll be alright. We told her a year ago that there may be a time when we would have to separate, but we assured her that it we wouldn't be moving so far that she couldn't see her daddy." Karen said, nodding.

"We told her that while we liked each other very much that there was someone else who I was supposed to be with, and she understood." Dib said. "Or, at least, she equated it to a fairy tale, and called Karen my substitute princess."

"She'll be alright." Karen assured Zim. "And so will I. If done civilly divorce doesn't always break the people involve."

Dib cuddled Zim and Zim cuddled back, a smile on his face. "Good." He sighed, feeling much more at ease. "Good."